The ARA tackles the housing issue

The Active Residents Assembly (ARA) is an initiative of the Organization Research Group to promote a more informed commitment in our community meetings and to experiment with different meeting techniques. So far, there have been five meetings of the ARA. The two most recent ones have been on the topic of housing.

The first such meeting began with a PowerPoint presentation describing the present housing ‘crisis’ – a severe lack of affordable housing in the community that makes it particularly difficult for young people with enthusiastic energy but limited means to find a place to live.

After the presentation, ARA participants split up into small groups to come up with possible solutions. These fell into three main categories: finding new accommodation and places to build; planning and construction; and financing affordable housing. In the finding places to live category, suggestions included making land available for low-cost housing (including areas liable to encroachment), and opening up existing communities for new affordable housing developments.

Under planning and construction, the need for strategic planning to tackle the present needs of those with limited means was emphasised. It was also suggested that an institute be created to research into healthy and sustainable housing, and that a central purchasing service for building materials would help bring down construction costs.

But how to finance new affordable housing? Suggestions included creating a housing fund into which individuals could make regular payments, requiring the commercial units to dedicate a percentage of their profits to housing, and encouraging co-operative housing projects.

In all, about thirty suggestions to solve or alleviate the present housing crisis were made at this meeting. However, there was little attempt to suggest how they could be implemented. This became the focus of the second meeting.

Participants were now asked to prioritise suggestions from the first meeting and then suggest how they could be implemented. The finding new accommodation/places to build group prioritised renting houses in surrounding villages; making land available for low-cost housing and experimentation; and freeing up space in existing communities. However, their top priority was the need for a survey of the land that is presently available for housing and of the density, occupancy and development possibilities in existing communities.

It was acknowledged that a number of such surveys already exist, so there is a need to collect them in one database that should be publicly available. The Housing Service should be empowered to do this work, although they may call upon other services for assistance.

The planning and construction group felt that three interlinked ideas were the most critical ones. Strategic planning for housing, based on the needs of Aurovilians and Newcomers; helping Aurovilians and Newcomers to build their own houses; and setting up a Building Service. Such a Service would facilitate the planning and construction of houses through bringing together all the relevant parties – plumbers, carpenters, architects etc. – and available expertise relating to building methods and materials.

Regarding strategic planning, this group felt the first step was to acquire information on the real needs of those seeking housing at present through a targeted survey.

They also identified two other fundamental changes needed to solve the housing problem. Firstly, converting the present crisis into an opportunity for joyful service that should involve Aurovilians rather than commercial builders in construction. Secondly, delinking contributions to the Housing Fund from the space that someone occupies. As they put it, “If we are able to take a more collective stance towards funding houses, we might be able to move away from ownership.”

The financing of housing group came up with a number of suggestions. They included promoting greater wealth in Auroville through encouraging new business ventures, including ‘super-units’ that would dedicate 100% of their profits to Auroville to fund housing; encouraging commercial units to dedicate a percentage of their profits to housing, as well as providing housing for their Aurovilian workforce; setting up a bulk purchase and storage unit for construction materials that would also sell to the general public (one of the participants is willing to help finance and coordinate this); and a free store for leftover building materials.

Some of these would require policy changes. Participants also felt a study group is required to properly understand the issues and true costs of these proposals.

There was also the realisation, shared by the other groups, that there is a need for a core team to take forward the key proposals from these two ARA meetings and try to ensure they are implemented. This will involve, among other things, coordinating with the relevant working groups and exploring relevant policy reforms.

Encouragingly, by the end of the meeting fifteen people had volunteered to be part of such a core/focus group. These meetings represent a new impetus and collective aspiration to tackle our housing challenge. Now the ball has to keep rolling...